Essays Upon Heredity and Kindred Biological Problems, Vol. 2 (Classic Reprint) - Couverture souple

August Weismann

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 1330330994 ISBN 13 : 9781330330999

Editeur : Forgotten Books, 2018

Synopsis

Excerpt from Essays Upon Heredity and Kindred Biological Problems

The Second Essay is concerned with the problem as to the origin of those higher mental-powers of civilized races which have played no part in the struggle for existence, and the high cultivation of which has been entirely independent of natural selection. I have chosen the art of music as an example, because it presents so deceptive an appearance of improvement by the inheritance of the results of practice from one generation to another.

A propos du livre

Présentation de l'éditeur

The four essays which constitute thisS econd Volume supplement those of the First, by bringing forward new facts to support the earlier ideas, and by improving and completing the latter on the basis of the most recent discoveries. CT he first two essays afford further support to the arguments in favour of the non-transmission of acquired characters, inasre much as they attempt to prove that these arguments hold in certain cases which at first sight appear to refute them. The diminution of parts which are no longer used has been exX plained in an earlier essay as the result of the cessation of natural selection, i.e. of panmixia. The conception that every part of the organism is maintained at the level it has reached only by means of the continued activity of natural selection, and that any intermission of this activity leads to a gradual diminution, has passed through many, minds. Darwin himself appears to have held this idea, andR omanes, and especially Seidlitz, have more or less clearly expressed it But the thought first attained its full significance when we arrived at the definite conclusion that theL amarckian principle of modification had no real existence, because acquired characters, and hence the decrease which organs suffer by disuse, are not inherited. Thus every explanation of the existence of disused parts in a rudimentary state fails, except panmixia; and the conclusion was unavoidable that the countless characters which enter into our conception of a species can only be maintained at their present level by the ceaseless activity of natural selection.
(Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.)

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Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Forgotten Books
• Date d'édition: 2018
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1330330994
• ISBN 13: 9781330330999
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 243
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